


Boys and Androids

by orphan_account



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Flowers, M/M, Winter, and other shindings, and things end up very different, futuristic detroit, in which hank gets connor to live with him to clean the house
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-16
Updated: 2018-06-16
Packaged: 2019-05-24 00:49:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14944511
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: And that's how it began. Life worked invariably in mysterious ways.





	Boys and Androids

“Do you need another shot, lieutenant?”

Hank wondered. The whisky tasted like day’s old blood in the back of his throat. At first it had been about taste, cool liquid that burned going down as if he had a furnace lodged in his throat. Now it was about numbing his temples.

He turned to face Connor. On his left side, the blue circlet that marked him out to be an android couldn’t be seen. His eyelashes, nanofibers woven over nanofibers, looked real as keratin. When a muscle twitched, adjacent cells tugged and twisted along with it.

“Yeah. Liquor this time.”

Connor gestured at the bartender. Deft hands, glass clinking, the noise of patrons drifting across the floor behind them. Hank felt the day’s work in every pore of his weary bones. Hundreds of homicide cases and h estill hadn't been killed.

“Have you ever kissed a man?” Connor asked.

Hank considered the question. He scratched his beard. Blinked. Synapses fired in his brain, determined to push past the alcoholic blockades. When the gravity of Connor’s question sank in, he sniffed and said, “What’s it to an android?”

“I’ve been programmed to exhibit an interest in human affairs. Based on my databank, your answer will help me work with people better.”

“Right…” the drink arrived. Connor swirled it. All of a sudden he’d lost his appetite for the mind-numbing substance.

He looked up and said to Connor, “Couple of them.”

“I see.”

“I lied.”

“What?”

Hank stood and straightened his lapels. “I’ve never even looked at a man that way. I just wanted to know how you’d react.”

“And is my reaction satisfactory?”

“Eh,” Hank shrugged.

Then he was gone.

It was outside, standing in line to board the metro that Hank thought of Connor’s reaction. The inexplicable question of his humanity weighed like stones in his mind. _I see_ didn’t mean anything. It was in the furrow of his eyebrows, the processing of raw data. Nothing more, nothing less. Cyberlife would’ve programmed him not to discriminate. Everything about Connor was someone else’s careful calculation.

Hank looked around at the throng of people buzzing around him. Weren’t humans the same?

Winter squalls tore through the streets of the suburban neighborhood. Drafts of snow raced across the night sky, tearing through his shaggy grey hair. Hank slipped out of his snow laden boots at the doorstep. He greeted Sumo with a treat from his pocket, some leftovers from the burger joint he’d been at for lunch.

Cole had been a picky eater. Sumo lapped up all the broccoli he refused. It seemed so long ago that Cole sat next to him by the dinner table, eating takeaway meals so Hank would arrive at work in time. So long ago since Cole was put in a casket and Hank dragged Sumo to the pound and almost put him up for adoption, for sale, anything. As long as he was _gone._ As long as everything was gone.

Hank peeled his coat off and sat at the dinner table. He pulled out his gun and pressed it against his bottom lip, the cold steel rim that was part of him. An indispensable appendage, as true to Detroit as her frigid winters.

_Shoot._

_Have you ever kissed a man?_

Hank imagined how an android’s lips would taste. He wondered if kissing one would make them more human to him, and if he would keep kissing them in spite of it. His phone vibrated. He set the gun down and pulled it out of his shirt pocket. Jeffrey, bitching at him about unfinished reports.

 _All right._ He sighed.  _Maybe another day._

* * *

 

When Hank wakes up again, he's not surprised to be alive. He brushes his teeth and throws out the wilted flowers in front of Cole’s bedroom door. He changes out of the coat that smells like spoiled mascarpone. There's sweeping to be done and he's not going to do it.

“Watch the house for me.”

Sumo whimpers in response. At least he's got chunky beef bits for breakfast.

Hank has his usual: a can of beer. Food won't cross his mind till later, settled at his office desk with Knights of the Black Death warming him up. Connor walks up to him and places a burger from Chicken Feed on his desk.

“I thought you might appreciate the sentiment, lieutenant.”

“What?” Hank flicks the paper bag. “Got some kind of biosensor that tells you how much I've eaten?”

“No. I just had a feeling you were hungry this morning.”

“A feeling, Connor?”

Gavin walks past them with a junior officer. He spits at Connor’s leather shoe.  _ Nanofiber,  _ Hank reminds himself.  _ He's nanofiber head to toe. _

“Stupid android,” Gavin says

When Connor refuses to respond, Gavin gets in his face and shoves him back against the desk. Hank finds himself reaching for the paper bag of hot, greasy burger and fries and tossing the contents over Gavin’s head. A tussle begins, bodies and limbs flailing. Someone lands a punch on Hank's face. He kicks them in the nuts. Hands descend to pry their tangled bodies apart, and the world is a smear of blue and black, the taste of iron on Hank's tongue.

Jeffery shrieks in the distance.  “Remember that novel length report?!”

“You can write a trilogy for all I care!” 

Hank gets up and drags Connor toward the nearest exit. Like an obedient puppy, Connor follows the winds of change. Humans are gods to him. Gods, in Hank’s experience, have never been useful for anything.

They stand face to face on the top floor of the office block. The metro whirrs beneath them, a silent train of vehicles drenched in daylight. Flecks of snow bury in between Hank’s shaggy locks of hair.  Connor is Connor. Completely unperturbed by Gavin’s assault. Not a wrinkle on his face that suggests instability, discontentment. But locks of keratin have fallen over his forehead and oil streaks his jacket. He seems alive. So alive.

“Come here.” Hank gestures at him with a finger. Connor stands next to him by the ledge.

“I'm going to take you to my house. You're sleeping over.”

“I do not-”

“Sleep.” Hank waved a hand. “I don't care. I want the place cleaned up, and we'll deal with emergencies better if you're around.”

"Okay."

And that's how it began. Life worked invariably in mysterious ways.

**Author's Note:**

> I draw a lot of DBH Hannor/ Simkus fanart if you want to check them out :)  
> enzelx-art.tumblr.com <3


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